Sometimes, In the Night
by herrjester
Summary: Sometimes, in the night, I wonder… just what the hell am I doing?  A story toying with Misa's psyche. Fun stuff. :3 Very, very slight language warning.


**Author's Note**: Yes, yes. This is my first submitted 'story.' It's mainly just character-play with Misa that started when I was listening to the song 'Wherever You Will Go' by The Calling. I thought it was something interesting other Misa-fans might like to peek at. :D

(PSSST! I don't own Death Note, nor it's characters. I totally wish I did, but nawh. Wasn't me. :P)

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><p>Sometimes, in the night, I wonder… just what the hell am I doing?<p>

There I am, feeling slightly paralyzed from my own weight, completely encased in dark, lying next to the one I couldn't bear to lose… and, instead of thanking of luck, I'm second-guessing everything. It's almost as if I die every night and become someone else entirely – someone entirely opposite. This someone, I think, hates me and everything I love. She hates me with such passion that she knows everything about me – even the things I've never thought. How can one be so smart?

I look to my left and see an angel with brown hair – rather messy brown hair that's blocking my view of his face. As I reach out to brush it away, I feel a familiar drunkness coming on and I nearly smile. A sudden crash in my head, a malfunction of data, forces me to whimper and draw back.

"He's no angel," she whispers through stolen lips.

I watch him in his only time of oblivious and whisper back, "No, he's a God."

She's disgusted. In this revulsion, she forces me off the bed. My tiny bit of clothing makes me cold.

"I'm cold," I complain as I stand awkwardly at the side of the bed.

"Why do you make yourself so?" she asks.

I rub my arms, but keep my head low and say nothing. No, I don't want to speak my shame, even though she already knows.

"You know, he doesn't even like this bleached hair, nor your painted face, or your trashy clothes – he thinks you look like a regular street whore."

The word 'whore' slaps me. I retaliate.

"No, he doesn't!"

Reality. I remember where I am. Hastily, I turn to see if I've woke him up. No – he's still just lying there. So, my head even lower, I turn back.

"He just thinks I'm a little extravagant. He thinks it's cute. Everyone thinks I'm cute."

She laughs a dark, sinister cackle.

"Everyone, but him."

I want to shout 'That's not true!' Instead, I murmur…

"He's got a lot on his mind right now. He's… He's a God in progress! He's making a new, perfect world… for us! How could I be so selfish as to demand so much attention?"

Yeah. Explain that one.

"Do you really think you mean anything to him? You kill. You're a murderer… just like those he punishes. There's no place for killers in his utopia, thus there's no place for you. Your eyes, darling, are just a mean to his end."

"But-!"

"But what? It's really very simple. Even an airhead like you should be able to figure it out."

What she said was technically true – I was, am a murderer. But I kill for him, at his request, in his name – shouldn't I be pardoned? Shouldn't I be pure – spared?

"And for what reason?" she asked. "You're an annoying little brat who is only best at getting in the way. Why would he even want you around?"

"Because… because…" I glanced back at him, but stopped myself before I saw anything more than his hair. Then, I finally looked up and shouted, "Because he loves me!"

An eerie silence fell around me. Was she finished with her spiel? Did I banish my subconscious doubt… just like that? For a minute or so, I stared at the curtains that lead to a glass door, which lead to a high balcony. Then, I laughed and rubbed my eyes.

"Now, really," I whispered in my insane humor, "what the hell AM I thinking?"

Somewhat composed, but with a pressure in my chest, I went forward to the curtains. Some fresh air, I thought, should do me good. So, I grasped the curtains and jerked them to the side. Instead of a dark sky, or another building, I saw my reflection. It startled me and caused a little gasp. When I realized it was only myself, a millisecond later, I sighed and giggled.

"It's only me," I whispered.

In another millisecond, the reflection shifted to a morbid, disfigured version of me.

"And who is that?" she shouted, as if seeing my face like that wasn't enough to scare my socks right off my feet. Naturally, I squeaked and tumbled back on to my rear end. All the while, she cackled as though it was the best joke in the world, instead of the oldest. My fear quickly turned into anger and I looked towards the glass to give her a piece of my mind, but she was gone. Her laughs were only echoes now.

"Oh, no, you don't!"

I pushed myself forward on to my knees and crawled back to the glass. For once, I thought I'd been clever and figured out the way to see her, but I only saw my own self. My own cute self, damn it.

A rustling from behind me caught my attention. Gasping harder than before, I poked my head up to see him moving. Only a moment later, he stopped and seemingly went back to sleep. Still, this made me even angrier. So, I ignored my reflection and finally went out on the balcony, careful to keep the door quiet as I opened and closed it.

"Now," I said with a voice louder than any I'd used inside on that night, "what the hell is your problem? Are you a shinigami? 'Cause I tell you now, I've had enough of you for one life! I wish none of you had ever come here! Don't you realize what you've done? Shouldn't it… Shouldn't it be against some… I don't know… great cosmic rule of intersection?" [sic]

I heard her sigh, but I couldn't tell where it'd come from, so I looked everywhere. It was to no avail.

"What are you – some new Shinigami nano?"

She laughed quietly, kind of like a mother does to her children's antics.

"You know, if the shinigami had never come, you would have never met Light."

My head was poked behind a chair when this was said. Upon my quick ascent, I hit my head on the concrete barrier that surrounded the edge of the balcony.

"Ouch…" I murmured as I rubbed the sore spot. "What do you know? Light and me are soul mates. We would have found each other eventually. " A silly smile worked its way onto my lips as I sat down and thought it over. "It was probably great cosmic intersection [sic] that made something like shinigamis real and sent them here, just for Light and me. So that not only can we meet and be together, we can also have this world as our own perfect one."

I felt so clever.

"Because, of course, you're that special," she said very condescendingly.

"I _guess_ so, because it happened, didn't it?"

"Is that what you really believe? What you really tell yourself to get back to sleep?"

I shifted in my seat and dropped my hand.

"Well, you would know."

She would. Just like how Light would always use logic to dance around L, I used my logic to dance around, well… her. Whoever she was.

"What's the point in tricking yourself?" she asked. "Is he so wonderful? Is the want for _your _perfect world so great that you'll merely… make it up?"

"Hey!" I pointed at the air. "I'm not making anything up. Light's right there. He is my perfect world. My mission is accomplished."

"Now you're just lying. You know this isn't what you want. You would rather have a normal life as an adored actress with a loving boyfriend. What you've got is-"

"Just that."

I didn't want to hear it.

"You're a pencil to his world of paper. "

I snorted. "I don't even know what that means. I'm Misa Amane. I'm Light's girlfriend who just so happens to be more useful than any other girlfriend. Isn't it a dream? To be both useful as a woman and a work partner? Other women only get half – I get it all."

"You really make me want to puke."

I stuck my nose up. "You're probably just jealous."

"Yeah, that's me. I can't tell you how much I'd love to be as delusional as you."

"You're the delusional one! Why can't you just let me be happy and leave me alone?"

"I don't believe you've been happy since the day your parents were killed, Misa Amane."

That struck a chord. I felt myself getting hot from pent-up frustration and anger… but who was it towards?

"Are you trying to make me depressed? Why would you bring up something like that?"

"Because that's when it started. Can you remember it, Misa? Can you remember the day?"

I looked at the windows of the building across the street.

"I don't want to."

"Then remember before that."

That didn't seem too bad, but I still couldn't bring myself to do it. Why?

"How about the Alice in Wonderland play in the third grade?"

A quick laugh escaped me as images of the play came back.

"Oh wow, I almost forgot about that."

In a group of brunette, full-blooded Japanese children, I – being only half Japanese – was the perfect choice to play Alice because of my blonde hair. It wasn't naturally as bright as I later dyed it, but it worked. Or, as I thought back then, everyone thought I was the cutest, so I got to do everything cool. Nevertheless, my parents thought it was great. My mother spent hours sewing my costume, never once complaining when I rudely requested something changed. My father acted out the various other parts, never once complaining when I claimed my messed up line was right. They were so…

"…so nice," I choked through long-forgotten tears.

When the night of the production came, they tended to all my early diva demands with a smile. They sat in the very front row, their eyes attentive and their ears open, as I acted. At the end, they started a standing ovation. Even through all my bratty behavior, I was truly thrilled.

"Because, in all honesty, I wanted everything perfect so they'd be proud of me." I wiped my face with my hands and sniffled. "I wanted to stick that feeling in a bottle and keep it with me forever. So, I forced my mother to sign me up for all kinds of pageants and whatnot. It was because of them that I'm 'Misa-Misa' now. But…"

My voice gave out and a flood of tears rushed down. I hid my face behind my knees and hands.

"That was the first and last time they ever saw you perform," she said for me. I nodded weakly.

"They…" I squeaked.

"They were killed," she said monotonously. I just cried even more.

Sure, they saw my modeling shots and a few lousy commercials, but I wanted them to see me really act again. They were never able to do that.

"Why did you continue?" she asked once my sobbing had subsided enough.

"Trying to become an actress?" I wiped myself again. "I don't know… I guess I figured they would still be proud of me if I did, even if I couldn't see them anymore."

"Or maybe you became an actress the moment they died. You became Misa-Misa, wonder-girl extraordinaire. Always happy. Always smiling. You didn't want to feel the pain, so you hid it underneath a façade. Where did the pain go?"

"That's bullshit!" I shouted. "I felt pain everyday – I still do! Just because I don't cry about it all the time doesn't mean it's not there."

"No one else sees it. How is it real, then? Real is defined by what is known and not known. They don't see it – it's not real. You don't look at it – it's not real. That's what you did… or what you tried to do… in order to cope with it. The courts weren't helping. The therapists weren't helping. Only you, Misa, could help you."

"Are you saying I'm in denial? Because I know that-"

"Not anymore. When Kira, Light, killed the one who killed your parents, he gave you help. The justice had been served. It was balanced. You could cope. That didn't kill Misa-Misa, however. She was just getting started."

I was caught between two incredibly sticky webs. One was numb – it was me not listening to her at all. The other was sense. Logic. As I looked back, what she said made sense. I didn't want to know.

"You were able to let Misa-Misa run completely free. Yes, you wondered about this Kira person and thought about how wondrous they must be, but also how dangerous. They had killed and were thus the same as…"

"No, no, no! I never thought that!"

"No, you wouldn't let yourself. You'd perk back up and say that Kira had balanced the world, or rather your world. All was well. In fact, you thought that you should thank Kira. Right? Because he'd fixed everything. He was like your personal guardian angel. He must be! Right? Maybe he only put on the disguise of Kira because you might have been blamed for the death otherwise. All the other criminals were just cover-ups. Kira only really cared about you."

"As romantic as that sounds…"

"No! Kira was actually cleaning the world for you, wasn't he? Even if he didn't know it. He was creating a world in which you would never be hurt again. Was he doing it for you? Was he doing it for the sake of everyone? You didn't know, but you wanted to. So while you thought these things that would probably be considered awful by the public face, you smiled and continued being the perfect little actress-in-training."

"So, what's wrong with that? I wanted to be known for my acting, not some fake scandal. If I'd said much about my support for Kira, the tabloids would have gone crazy with it and said I supported a killer. I support justice, not killing."

I nodded; that's right.

"Kira was going to create a perfect world. You supported this. Kira was making so you couldn't be hurt. This was wonderful. Then that stalker came along."

I shuddered.

"He was going to kill you. He wanted to kill you. How could this happen? With Kira around and obviously aware of you, this shouldn't happen. You screamed and begged for Kira to help. And what happened?"

"He heard me!" I said excitedly. "Or, so I thought."

"Yes. The stalker dropped dead and you thought Kira had saved you. You were delighted."

That was very true. As soon as the man had dropped, I laughed and danced and thanked the sky, where at the time I thought Kira resided.

"I really thought Kira was a God then. How else could he have seen me?"

"Then, the Death Note and Rem came along."

I smiled. "Then I learned Kira was a human, like me. Twice, he'd saved me. I had to meet him."

"So you devised your plan and decided to do anything and everything to meet Kira. With the Death Note and the eyes, you could not only meet Kira, but help him."

"It seemed so divine. I thought that my brushes with death were more than okay. They had happened so I could meet Kira. I was almost happy it had happened."

"In the midst of this new found hysteria, you saw him."

I ignored the word 'hysteria,' and focused on remembering that day in Aoyama.

"I fell in love."

"He was a normal boy, like you were a normal girl. Both human at least. You imagined yourself at his side, seated on top of the most beautiful world. Rem tried to talk some sense into you. Kira killed killers and by that point you were a killer. Why should he need you?"

"The eyes."

"Yes. Maybe you wouldn't be the queen of a new world, but at least you could help Kira be a king. To be used by him would flutter your heart enough."

"…Right. But, but that's not how it turned out! Light does love me. Why else do we share a bed?"

"Because you're dangerous. You could kill him if you wanted. You're just so unstable, honey, that he can't even predict what you'll do. So, he obliges, so he won't be killed. You're his Kira, in a way. If he does what you deem wrong, you can kill him, just like he kills those who do what he deems wrong."

"He's scared of me?" I gasped. "But that… That's not right. He could kill me, too!"

"Not with Rem around, remember? He can't so much as lay a finger on you."

I thought it over, but couldn't find a way out.

"I don't want that! I don't want him to be scared of me! I want him to love me!"

But he does, doesn't he? Light loves Misa, right?

"No, he doesn't love you. He's a bored little boy playing a game, and cheating most of the time."

"So, then… What am I? Just a pawn?"

"Ah, maybe a rook, but you seem to get the picture. Finally."

I tried to loop around, but there was no escape. Gradually, I began shaking and getting hot again.

"But that's not how it's supposed to be!" I shouted at the air. "He's supposed to love me! Why else would my parents have been killed? Why else was I attacked? Why was I given the Death Note? Why?"

I jerked my head down, my hands laced at the base of my neck. Nothing made sense.

"I thought you were okay with just being used by him…?"

I threw my fist at the air.

"I am, but I'm not supposed to be!"

Nothing made sense. I couldn't think anymore.

"Misa Amane, are you happy?"

"No," I sobbed.

"Why aren't you happy?"

"I don't… I don't know." I lifted my head up. "Do you?"

I could see her as clearly as I could see my hands. She was a little blonde, half-Japanese girl in a blue dress.

"My parents died for nothing," she said, her face never moving.

"They just died, didn't they? That's all they did. Died. There's no meaning. People die. It doesn't matter, does it?"

She giggled, "Nope."

I sat back and looked up at the stars.

"None of this has anything to do with Light or Kira or the Death Note. What does it matter if Light loves me or not? What does it matter if Kira kills or not? What does it matter if I have a Death Note or not? There's no meaning in any of it."

"I just want my mommy and daddy to see me act," she said. "I just want to make them proud. Do you think they're proud of you?"

I paused.

"They were killed. Their killer was killed by my boyfriend. Maybe. Who really knows? It's not like they're here… right? Killers, killing… I'm tired of trying to decide who is right and who is wrong. What's it matter? I should do what I want, right? Is this the big epilogue? [sic]"

I glanced at her. She smiled.

"To hell with what I'm supposed to do," I decided, and then kicked back in my chair, feeling suddenly confident.

"Do you hate Light?" she asked.

"Do I hate Light? Sometimes, in the night… I wish it would never come back."

"What are you going to do? Are you going to make mommy and daddy proud?"

"No…" I told her.

My voice was cut off by the sound of the glass door sliding open. A somewhat groggy Light poked his head through.

"What are you doing, Misa?"

I sighed, stood up, stretched, and then began walking towards him. Just as I passed by him, I replied, "I'm acting."

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><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>: The bit about the play and her parents was made up by me. So, if you were like 'LOL I DON'T REMEMBER THIS!' - Don't worry. n_n;

I hoped you liked it! :D


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